Mr Alu Alkhanov has been declared the new President of Chechnya today after the election commission said preliminary results show he had won 74.48 per cent of vote in weekend elections.
"We can say now for sure that Chechnya elected a president in the first round," head of the commission
Mr Alkhanov (47), a career policeman handpicked by Russia's President Vladimir Putin, now faces a battle to garner some of the standing enjoyed by his predecessor Mr Akhmad Kadyrov, assassinated in May, and to bring stability to a region where separatists are becoming more audacious in their attacks.
"I feel an enormous burden of responsibility," Itar-Tass news agency quoted him as saying after the first returns from the polls appeared. "I feel no euphoria. There is a clear understanding that a lot of hard work is ahead."
Despite the commission's satisfaction with the elections, Mr Movsur Khamidov, a high-ranking officer in the FSB security service who came second 9 per cent of the vote, questioned the result.
"My observers have noticed a lot of violations during the election including fake ballot papers," he told reporters.
The poll took place against a backdrop of heavy fighting in Chechnya and two plane crashes that killed at least 89 people elsewhere in Russia.
Investigators say traces of explosives were found on both planes, and many Russians blame Chechen separatists for the disasters.
Yesterday, a man identified as a wanted Chechen rebel was killed by his own bomb near a polling station in the capital, Grozny. He had tried to enter the polling station but while running away triggered the device, an election official said. No one else was hurt.